The Unpleasantness at Baskerville Hall (Reeves & Worcester Steampunk Mysteries Book 4) (6 page)

“I searched high and low for secret passages when I was a boy,” said Henry. “I measured the house inside and out. There are no spaces unaccounted for.”

“You’re not saying it’s a real ghost?” asked Emmeline.

“Of course not,” said Henry. “But... I can’t see how anyone could have run in here, written that message, then disappeared. There wasn’t time.”

Reeves, for who else could it have been, coughed from the corridor.

“This is my man Reeves,” I said. “Do you have an observation?”

“I do, sir. Mister Henry is correct in his assertion that there was insufficient time to write that message and effect an escape, ergo the message was written earlier.”

Words are insufficient to encapsulate the enormity of Reeves’ brain. Perhaps a hieroglyph could do it justice — an extra large one with an all-seeing eye and a couple of fish.

“Go on, Reeves,” I said. “What else do you deduce?”

“I suspect, sir, that the open door to this room, and the message inside, were what is commonly called a red herring, designed to detain his or her pursuers while the perpetrator made good their escape elsewhere.”

“Then they’re still in this wing,” said Henry. “No one could have doubled back down this corridor. We’d have seen them. Come on. We’ll search every room.”

Every room off the corridor was searched. Nothing was found. No ghost, no abandoned black dress, and no further missives written on mirrors.

“Could the ghost have been a projection?” asked Sir Robert.

“I don’t think so, Sir Robert,” said T. Everett. “There would have been a cone of light from the projector to the image. There wasn’t one. I looked.”

“So how did they escape?” said Henry. “Every window is locked.”

Cometh the locked room mystery, cometh the cough.

“Not
every
window, sir,” said Reeves as a roomful of eyes swivelled his way. “I did notice that one, although closed, was unlatched.”

“Which one?”

“The one in the room opposite to the one with the message, sir.”

I’m not sure how many there were of us, but by this time we were a sizeable party of guests and servants, and all of us followed Henry into the room with the unlatched window.

Henry hoisted up the lower pane of the sash window and let in half a gale that lifted both curtains towards the ceiling.

“I can’t see anything,” said Henry, leaning out into the night. “There’s no ladder or anything to climb down on.”

“May I borrow your lamp?” I asked Henry. “I have some experience in this line of work.”

I took the lamp, and leaned out of the window. Henry was right about the lack of anything nearby to climb down on. No drainpipe, no handy tree or climbing shrub. If someone had left by this window they’d have needed a ladder. And if our driver had been right about it having been a wet spring and winter, then a ladder would have left two distinctive marks in the lawn below.

I led the house party outside and around the Hall to the East Wing. The weather was wild but, thankfully, the rain was holding off.

“That’s the window,” said Henry. “The second one along from where the wing meets the old house.”

I advanced cautiously towards the spot where any ladder would have been placed, checking the ground for those tell-tale signs much beloved by us consulting detectives — the imprint of an unusual boot, the hole left by a wooden leg — but found nothing.

Neither did I find any marks left by the feet of a ladder. And yet, the ground was decidedly soft.

“I can’t see any signs of a ladder,” said Henry. “Can you?”

I extended the search area. What if the ladder had been exceedingly long and placed further away from the wall? I scrutinised the entire area, stooping low with the lamp to examine the minutest blade of grass.

Nothing.

“Would a woman’s weight on the ladder be sufficient to make a mark?” asked Sir Robert.

“It would,” said Emmeline. “Look, my heels are sinking into the lawn.”

“Mine aren’t,” said Ida. “But then ... I’m not as heavy as you.”

“Yes, you are!” said Emmeline.

“No, I’m not! Am I, Henry? Only yesterday you remarked how dainty I was.”

For a good second or two Henry looked like a chap about to feign a heart attack. But he recovered. “Both of you are, of course, exceedingly dainty, but our ladders are not. And this ground is as soft as I’ve ever seen it. I can’t see even a cat being able to climb a ladder here without leaving a mark.”

Ida wasn’t finished.

“What about a ghost?” she said haughtily. “They don’t weigh anything at all. Couldn’t a ghost climb down the ladder without making a mark?”

“A ghost wouldn’t
need
a ladder!” said Emmeline, a little more pointedly than is usual in polite society.

“A ghost wouldn’t leave footprints in the lawn either!” said Ida. “Because
they
don’t plod like a carthorse.”

“I don’t
plod
—”

In the interest of preserving decorum — and the crime scene — I thought it wise to intervene.

“Wait!” I said “There’s another place the ladder could have been erected.”

Emmeline and Ida drew back from each other and turned my way.

“Where?” said Henry.

“If the ladder was long enough, it could have been propped up against the main house and angled such that it passed by the window in the East Wing.”

“Running parallel to the wing, you mean?” said Henry.

“Yes.”

We searched along the base of the East Wing, but again found nothing. And then it began to pour down — a veritable cloud burst with accompanying thunder and lightning.

“We’ll continue this investigation in the morning,” said Henry. “There’s nothing more we can do tonight.”

Once inside the HalI, I drew Emmeline and Reeves aside.

“I didn’t say anything earlier,” I said, keeping my voice low. “But have either of you seen Lupin this evening?”

“I knew it!” whispered Emmeline. “The moment Henry said there was no ladder or anything to climb down, I knew you’d suspect Lupin. I haven’t seen him at all this evening.”

“The figure purporting to be a ghost did not ambulate like Lupin, sir. It was also taller.”

“I think you underestimate Lupin, Reeves. I expect he can walk like a deb if the mood takes him. And that glowing head was obviously false. Lupin was probably wearing it like a hat.”

“If you say so, sir.”

Six

had somewhat of a disturbed night what with the continual lightning flashes, thunder claps, and rain lashing against the windows. It was more like one of those wild storms one experiences in the south of France than the more genteel English variant. I half-expected Reeves to waken me for breakfast wearing a sou’wester.

“Has it stopped raining, Reeves?” I asked as he drew back the curtains.

“The weather appears most clement, sir. Mr Berrymore is of the opinion that the day will be a sunny one.”

“Something of an expert is he, Reeves? The owner of one of those meteorological bunions, perhaps?”

“I really couldn’t say, sir.”

“Any sightings of Lupin this morning?”

“He is taking breakfast with the family, sir.”

“Really? What about spectral sightings? Have there been any more overnight?”

“None, sir, though opinion in the servants’ hall is that last night’s visitation was not a dissimulation. There is considerable concern for Sir Robert. Mr Berrymore remembers the last time the ghost appeared, and that was on the eve of Sir Robert’s father’s death.”

“We don’t believe in ghosts though, do we, Reeves?”

”No, sir.”

That was a relief.

A little later I toddled down to breakfast. If the day were to be a sunny one, Emmeline and I could go for a walk. We’d have to set off at different times to avoid the gimlet-eye of Lady Julia, but we could soon meet up at some pre-arranged local landmark. And there was always the chance that, after last night’s ghostly manifestation, Lady Julia’s attention might be directed elsewhere.

I breezed into the dining room.

“What ho, what ho, what ho,” I said, waggling four welcoming fingers and a companionable thumb.

“Are
you
responsible for that abomination last night?” snapped Lady Julia.

“I told you, Aunt Julia,” said Henry. “Roderick never left my side all evening. It can’t have been him.”

Lady Julia appeared unswayed.

“Doesn’t anyone else find it strange that it happened within hours of his arrival?” she said.

“Henry’s right, Julia,” said Sir Robert. “We were all there. We all saw Roderick follow Henry up the stairs in pursuit of the apparition. It wasn’t him.”

“What about Lily?” said Lady Julia. “Where was she?”

“Lily and I were talking in the dining room when the ghost appeared,” said Henry. “It wasn’t her either.”

Every head at the table nodded in agreement with the exception of Lupin and Lady Julia. Emmeline gave me a reassuring smile. Lupin smirked.

I noticed the line of serving domes on the breakfast sideboard and ankled over. I hoped there’d be a kipper or two left. I had the feeling that my little grey cells were going to need every assistance if I were to survive the day unscathed.

I found the kippers and pondered over whether to take two or three. Three would give my brain a good fillip, but it would probably elicit a biting comment from Lady Julia concerning gluttony.

I piled two on my plate and headed for the dining table. As one of the available seats was next to Lupin, I chose the one on the far side of the table, next to Ida.

“Do you think it was a real ghost last night, Roderick?” asked Ida.

“I do not,” I said, giving Lupin — who was sitting opposite — the kind of challenging look that Sherlock Holmes would have given Professor Moriarty had they met over a kipper. “I think the ‘ghost’ is very much alive ... and under this very roof as we speak.”

Lupin narrowed his eyes, put down his banana, and slowly slid off his chair.

“Who do you think it is?” asked Ida.

I was too distracted with Lupin’s disappearance to reply immediately. Where had he gone? What was he doing under the table? I feared for my legs, and all stations south.

I was not alone in my apprehension. Several heads darted this way and that, trying to discern where Lupin might surface.

“He likes playing under the table,” said Henry. “He can stay there for hours. Do you have a suspect, Roderick?”

A large unseen hand grasped my knee. “No,” I said, nudging the upper tenor register. “It could be anyone.”

A second large unseen hand grasped my other knee, then a third hand curled around my foot. How many orang-utans were down there?

The next second I had the answer — none — for Lupin burst out from beneath the table, leaped onto my lap and sent both me and the chair flying backwards. The chair and I soon parted company, but not Lupin and I. We remained entangled, rolling across the floor.

“Don’t worry,” said Henry. “He’s only playing. The two of us wrestle a lot.”

I hadn’t wrestled since I was a child. And I’d never wrestled anyone with four hands! Lupin was also deceptively strong. He may have been half my size, but he was the stronger.

“He must really like you,” said Henry. “I’ve never seen him wrestle anyone else.”

“I expect he’s excited at finally meeting his intellectual equal,” said Lady Julia.

I’m sure Lady Julia meant it as an insult, but as I lay pinned to the floor, staring up into Lupin’s eyes, I could see the fearsome intellect of a simian Moriarty perched upon my chest.

Lily screamed. “He’s ripped Roderick’s hand off!”

Ida echoed Lily’s scream. “She’s right. Look!”

If I’d had any air left in my lungs, I’d have screamed too. I swivelled my head instead, following the track of Ida’s finger. There, a foot away from my nose, lay a severed hand!

I screamed airlessly. How? When? I had no pain from either hand — both as far as I could tell were pinned to the floor by Lupin — but ... the evidence of my mutilation was before my very eyes!

Lupin observed the severed hand too. He jumped off me, snatched the hand and bounded towards the window. I took the opportunity to raise both wrists from the floor...

Both my hands were where they should be. I was whole.

Emmeline was the first to reach me. I suspected she might have cantered over the top of the dining table, as one of her heels had spiked a kipper.

She knelt by my side, ashen-faced, staring at my hands. “You’re not hurt!” she said. “I thought...”

She stifled a sob, turning it into a relieved laugh.

“If it’s not
your
hand, whose is it?” said Henry. “Lupin! Come down from there!”

Lupin had taken refuge on the pelmet above the window. He sniffed the severed hand and didn’t seem to find the experience pleasant.

Henry and Sir Robert stood under the window remonstrating with Lupin. Lady Julia was the only one of our party to remain seated. She shook her head in a despairing fashion and pronged a kipper.

“There’s another one!” said Emmeline pointing under the dining table.

“Another what?” I asked, scooting backwards on hands and heels. Not another orang-utan, I hoped.

“Another hand,” she said.